Mostly irrelevant ramblings about music, comic books and other aspects of pop culture with the occasional political rant from an anti-statist perspective.

Thursday, June 13, 2013

Top 13 Superman Storylines

Tonight the midnight release of the new Superman movie, Man of Steel, hits the theaters. I will taking my teenage daughter and my son to go see it (all 3 of us are nerds - lol).

To commemorate the release of this film, today's Top 13 list is a list of my top 13 favorite Superman-related storylines. Most of them are from the comic books but some venture off into other platforms.

Here they are, listed in chronological order by year of release:

1. Superman: The Movie

Released in 1978, the story for this movie was written by Mario Puzo. The film was directed by Richard Donner and starred Christopher Reeve in the iconic role.

2. Crisis on Infinite Earths

Comic book story release din 1985 and written by Marv Wolfman that encompassed not only Superman but the entire DC Comics universe.

3. Superman: Man of Steel

This storyline was written by John Byrne and came out in 1986. It is the Superman origin story by which all other Superman origin stories are measured.

4. Death of Superman

The tale of Superman's colossal battle with Doomsday that resulted, sort of, in his untimely end, came out in 1992.

5. Kingdom Come

One of the best graphic novels ever, Kingdom Come was set in a future world where Superman and the other major heroes of DC come out of retirement to combat an unusual threat. It was written by Mark Waid and Alex Ross and released in 1996.

6. Smallville

This television series first came out in 2001 and lasted until 2011. There were various writers on the show and starred Tom Welling as the role of Clark Kent.

7. Red Son

This comic book storyline was set in an alternate universe where Kal-El landed in Soviet Russia instead of Kansas. It came out in 2003 and was written by Mark Millar.

8. Birthright

Another origin story which was written by Mark Waid. It came out in 2003. While not as good as other Superman origin stories it still deserves a spot on the top 13 list.

9. Infinite Crisis

Another DC-wide crossover storyline, this one was written by Geoff Johns and came out in 2005.

10. Last Son

In another tale of Superman written by Geoff Johns, this 2006 story reveals that Superman might well have not been the Last Son of Krypton.

11. Secret Origins

Another Superman origin story. This one was another Geoff Johns Superman story. A better origin story than Birthright but probably not quite as good as Byrne's Man of Steel. This one came out in 2009.

12. Superman: Earth One

A very interesting take on the Superman mythos. This one you just have to read to figure it out. It was written by J. Michael Straczynski and came out in 2010.

13. Injustice: Gods Among Us

This was a video game that was just released recently and tells the story of how things would turn out if Superman decided that the governments of the world weren't doing a good enough job of stopping crime and takes over the world as a dictator.